Recently in 2 Category
I chopped my hair off on Sunday. Not all of it, of course -- I suspect I have a funny-shaped head under all this hair -- but a good seven inches or so. It was time. I haven't had my hair as long as it was, halfway down my back, since I was a little kid, and I grew it until I couldn't stand it anymore, and then I chopped it off.
It was sort of symbolic, the purging of my long hair, in the strange way that I make all significant changes in my life symbolic. Every piercing that I've ever gotten (with the exception of the four holes in my ear lobes that I got when I was a kid) has had a hidden meaning, or something it's meant to remind me of. I never share those. The hair, though -- in my mind, that was about shedding some recent burdens that have been troubling me lately.
I've been struggling with my own involvement in life lately. It happens periodically, something like a mild-grade depression that makes me want to distance myself from everything for a while. I'm a big fan of escapism, to be honest. I haven't been called on it this time, to the extent that I usually am -- maybe everybody else is feeling distanced right now, too. No more potential stalkers have come out of the woodwork; in fact, the one I had seems to have fallen off the face of the earth.
I took a trip to the San Antonio Zoo with my friend Kara on Saturday and pulled out my camera for the first time in a very very long while. That was good, too, my return to photography. Then Sunday, the hair went away. It's better now.
So there you have it. My silence is broken, and with it gone, the writing is bound to come back soon, accompanied by new and interesting pictures. Very soon.
I have a necklace made of hematite, with a carved turtle pendant that hangs from it. It fits close to my neck like a choker, and the turtle sits right at the hollow of my throat. The turtle is a rough carving in the polished mineral, all lines and angles, but I like turtles a lot -- I identify with them -- so I couldn't leave without this necklace when I found it.
When I wear my necklace, I'm struck by the way that the hematite conducts heat. I can pull it from around my neck and still feel the warmth from my throat in the body of the turtle.
I was in a foul mood today, from morning until nightfall, and it felt like a great deal of self-restraint not to take my grouchiness out on the world around me. Every time I tugged the turtle away from my throat, it was hot on my palm, as though it had basked in the late afternoon sun, rather than sitting nestled against my throat. I took it to mean that I'm ready for another weekend very soon.
As stressed as I find myself feeling, I should remind myself that my life could be far, far worse. There's nothing like the evening news to remind me of that. I could've exposed my bare nipple to hundreds of millions of Super Bowl watchers last night, for instance.
...Suddenly, things are looking up a bit.
I've been feeling a bit tongue-tied lately, which goes without saying, I guess. I hadn't realized it had been two weeks since I updated; I've been remaining blissfully ignorant of all things waterlilies.
And truthfully, when I don't update, it's usually because nothing interesting is going on in my world anyway, and unless you really want to hear about my 10-hour days (which I don't generally talk about, since they relate to work), you don't want to know anyway.
The short version:
We've been hanging out with our cool neighbors a decent amount lately. Two weekends ago, we got to play with their Holgaroid camera setup. We took some super-cool crazy pictures that I alternately love and hate. I'd post a few of them, but I'm afraid someone would petition to have me forcibly committed.
C and I saw The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King finally. It's a brilliant movie, of course, but very intense. I have this inner geek that I've buried and hidden deep within my psyche, but secretly? She'd love to learn Elvish.
C and I (and the cool neighbors) went to a State of the Union Address party, complete with the 2004 State of the Union drinking game last Tuesday. I counted something like 89 drink cues, many of which required two or three drinks. Luckily, I'd made my wine into a spritzer, but nevertheless, Wednesday was a bit painful. You'd think I had learned my lesson last time we were out with the cool neighbors.
In other news, I learned on Sunday that if you let your journal languish long enough (almost two weeks seems to be the magic number for me), random readers will come out of the woodwork and ask you out. I've never been asked out by a random reader before, so either you're all a bunch of slackers or said reader is a Potentially Wacko Stalker. I'm not entirely sure which is true in this case, but this guy seems reasonably non-wacko, which leads me to believe that the rest of you are just a bunch of slackers.
He's waiting for word from me about where I'd like to go, but I don't think I've actually said 'yes' to the offer of a date yet. I feel a bit as though I should make him prove himself before I agree to go out with this guy. I could require him to submit his full name and date and place of birth, so that I can run a criminal background check and let Kramer run a full astrological profile. I could subject him to a battery of questions from my friends. I could make him hold a serious conversation with my dad. (
It was nice weather this morning, and I'm still under the mistaken impression that Mondays are good days to demonstrate resolve, so I walked to work. It was chilly and cold, and I left the house at about 7:40, which put me to work around 8:20, which is really no later than usual. I love that walk for its ability to generate quiet time and a way to think. I tend to generate journal entries in my head when I walk to work, which is why I always seem to write about it.
Today's walk took me past the busy intersection where people moved frenetically on their way to work; past the victory garden that I'm so jealous of, which has vegetables growing in mid-January; past an apartment complex where the pungent odor of pot wafted out the window (I don't know about you, but in my world, 8am is a bit early for pot); past the bakery with heavenly smell of bread; past the taco shack where I stopped to get my usual: a potato and egg taco; past the school where children run inside, eager to start their day; past the churches whose spires and steeples touched the brilliant blue sky.
And then home again after work, racing the sunset this time. It's a dangerous walk in the dark, but the days are lengthening a bit, and I made it home after the sun set but before night fell.
That was my day; how was yours?
The next-door neighbors invited C and me over for dinner last night -- some sort of yummy vegetarian Indian concoction. We love our next-door neighbors; they're around the same age as we are, and they're incredibly funny, so we were glad to go over for dinner. I bought a bottle of Chiraz on the way home from work, and we took it over there with us.
The next-door neighbors have the distinction of being even more easily-amused than I am. When there is nothing to do, they're gifted at making up entertainment for themselves and for others. They have a collection of wigs to use for dress-up, for instance, and there's always booze to be had to further the cause a little. Last night, the wigs stayed safely put away, but after the four of us polished off three bottles of wine, they pulled out the sketch pads, and we started drawing portraits of one another with charcoal pencils.
Next-door neighbor drew a (really flattering) portrait of me that looked nothing like me; it looked a bit like Catherine Zeta-Jones, though, which seemed in keeping with the Chicago theme that C and I kept extending through the evening. I drew a quick portrait of everyone in the room, and to my (rather inebriated) eye, some of them came out pretty well. Much laughter ensued, and we didn't stumble home (it was only next door, after all) until after midnight.
Needless to say, the morning, in which I had to attend a project management seminar, was a bit painful. It wasn't a hangover or anything like that -- I don't get hangovers -- but I was painfully tired when I crawled out of bed in the morning.
It's not so much that I'm against drunken debauchery; it's more that I should probably refrain from it on Monday nights.
Shopping for furniture wasn't really in our plans today, but C and I tagged along with my mom, grandmother, and aunt when they went out to find a new couch for my grandmother's den. It was, well, enlightening.
We started off at Ethan Allen, where the saleswoman, Shelley, directed us gently through the faux rooms of the store. She seemed to know intuitively when to let us explore on our own and when to be there to answer questions for us. She directed us to the couches that best suited our needs, including the ones with shallower and firmer seats, and helped us custom-choose pieces to fit together into a set. It was all very expert -- she basically custom-fit a sofa and a super-comfortable chair to our butts, long before we ever even mentioned such mundane issues as price. But it was Ethan Allen, and everything is custom-ordered, so of course, the furniture was very expensive. We had a couple of other places to go before we made a decision.
Next, we went to Ashley Furniture. We were hardly in the door before we were attacked by a salesman there. Before he'd even pointed us to the couches, he had already explained their financing programs; clearly, the demographic of this store was different from the one we had been in a few minutes before. The young salesman didn't know anything about any of the furniture in the store. None of the pieces could be custom-upholstered; it all had to be bought as it appeared. I think we were in that store for seven minutes before we left. Quickly.
Finally, we went to Braslau's, a local furniture store. The saleswoman there was at least a bit knowledgeable about the furniture in the store, though she seemed a bit put out about helping us. I was a bit disappointed when my grandmother decided to buy a sofa and a recliner from Braslau's, rather than from Ethan Allen, but there was no denying that she spent less on the entire set than one chair from the other store would have cost.
The financing process was a hassle that involved what (to our overactive imaginations) appeared to be a booking, in a stark, sterile room surrounded by unsavory characters. C and I were convinced that at Ethan Allen, the financing process would involve warm coffee, fresh-baked elegant pastries, and a far more cordial atmosphere. In the end, I think my grandmother wound up writing a check. Far less hassle that way.
As for me, I'd've preferred Shelley.
After eleven hours on the road, I'm feeling a bit nutty this evening. By the time we were within 100 miles of Corpus Christi, C and I were both slap-happy; the Chicago soundtrack on repeat didn't help matters much.
We set out from El Paso early in the morning and made great time, despite stopping several times to stretch our legs or buy refreshments.
I'll probably need a bit more time to reflect before I can really provide a retrospective about our road trip, but the part I figured out on the long drive home today is this: you can get as much out of a journey as you're willing to.
There was a time in my life when I was a destination girl. I'd have preferred being flown from point A to point B; I didn't want to bother with the distance in between. I think my philosophy has changed somewhat over time. This trip was planned as a way to explore a region of the country. Not three cities in various parts of the country, but the entire region. This was as much out of necessity as because of possibility; it was cheaper to drive and stay in motels than it likely would have been to fly, and we had time to drive, so we did. It was a completely different trip as a result.
And for the most part, I really enjoyed that part of it. I liked how the landscape changed significantly from hour to hour (to hour to hour to hour); the shift is so gradual that I've never noticed it before, and yet profound enough to be constantly obvious. I'm glad we didn't retrace our path, other than from El Paso to Corpus Christi. We saw so many different environments by going through northern New Mexico and Arizona than we would have seen if we had remained in the southern parts of those states.
But the drive from El Paso to around Junction? Boring as hell, especially the second time around. Geez.
Covering 3,500 miles in 7 days has changed my perspective on distances a bit. The 200-mile drive from Corpus Christi to Austin, which I have long dismissed as lengthy and boring, will seem like a short jaunt after all the driving we've been doing lately.
After a long day of driving, we find ourselves back in El Paso again, enjoying the hospitality of CY once more. Tomorrow morning, we'll depart early-early and drive to Corpus Christi, where the cats have been vacationing (at the Resort d'Mom).
As it happens, we didn't get to do two of the things we really wanted to do today. The plan had been to see the Gila cliff dwellings, but those wound up being a much longer drive than we had anticipated. We drove along the curvy mountain road until we were at about 7,500 feet in altitude, and then we realized there were 22 more miles to go until we got to the cliffs, so we turned around and went back through Pinos Altos and Silver City to get to I-10. Along the way, we did see some lovely pine forests with snowfall up on the mountain.
After our fruitless trip up the mountain, there wasn't enough time to get back to White Sands by 4pm. When we were there last week, we noticed that they had a sunset hike through the dunes, and we had wanted to go along, but it wasn't really possible within our time constraints today. If we'd known the Gila cliffs weren't going to happen, we could've rearranged our schedule. Next time, we'll know.
What we did do this morning (besides drive a lot) is go to the Saguaro National Park near Tucson. It was the only good thing about Tucson, as far as we're concerned. There were all sorts of cactus there besides the saguaro, as well as birds and other wildlife we hadn't seen before. We saw a pair of coyotes running along the roadside on the way to the park and a rabbit inside the park itself, and of course, we took a bunch of cactus photos. My favorites, of course, were the ones with C posing alongside the cactus. I'll post those tomorrow when we get back to Corpus.
We have a long day ahead of us, so I'm headed to bed. More tomorrow, hopefully.
Today is our last day in Arizona, and we expect to be back in Texas (barely) by this evening sometime. We'll drive through the Saguaro National Park this morning, then head east toward New Mexico, where we have a couple of activities planned. I'll write about those later.
Yesterday, we spent the morning and early afternoon in San Diego. We went to Old Town San Diego, a state park that has reproduced the center of the original town, and wandered around for a few hours. The opportunity to walk and get some fresh air was refreshing after so much cold weather for our trip, and we had the opportunity to stretch our legs finally. We stopped at a little Mexican bakery and bought a couple of churros to munch on, the only substantial food we ate until our New Years Eve dinner mentioned in the last entry.
Then we returned to Ocean Beach and walked along the surf again. There were only a few surfers at noontime, and for the most part, they sat along the shore and watched the waves. We walked along the water, took some pictures, and watched the seagulls, then left reluctantly. I think the Pacific managed to singlehandedly improve C's impression of California, following the unnerving traffic we had experienced a couple of nights before as we went through the outskirts of L.A.
Then it was a straight shot to Tucson on I-8. "Straight" is a bit of a misnomer, though -- the interstate was full of mountain stretches that were curvy and dizzying with switchbacks, and we didn't arrive in Tucson until around 9pm.
After a long day like that, a restful New Year's Eve was definitely the best plan.
We've been without internet access for the last couple of days, so I've got to fill in the gaps a bit. C and I are in San Diego tonight, our second night in southern California. It was a beautiful day in San Diego today; chilly, but nothing like the sub-freezing temperatures we'd been shivering through the past few days.
C and I wrote the following bit while driving through the Mojave Desert yesterday. I was driving and she was typing, for the record. I like to call it, "Why Everything Wrong with California is Gov. Schwarzenegger's Fault; A Series in Eight Parts."
We're in California, in the middle of the Mojave desert. It just occured to us that we're in Arnold Schwarzenegger country, and suddenly, things make so much more sense. In the hour that we've been in California, we've noticed the following things wrong with the state:
- The smog. We can't even see the mountains for all the smog. There isn't a city around for miles and miles, and yet there's smog.
- The sun does not set. We don't know where it went, but it didn't set. It's dark now, and we can't see the cactus, and it's only 4:30 in the afternoon; we hypothesize that the sunset was lost behind the enormous head of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
- This highway has some major holes. No further explanation needed.
- The rest stop is broken; we think they--the people of California headed by the big head of Arnold--did it on purpose so we couldn't take a picture of the cactus in the Mojave desert. First, they told us there would be a rest stop in 18 miles; then the rest stop was closed down, and the sign said "next rest stop 78 miles."
- The Coke bottle, which was purchased in Arizona, is not compatible with the state of California; it won't open despite previously having been opened in Arizona.
- There are too many cars, and when they break, people kick them with hatred and throw things at them; this might be related to item number 3, the holes in the road.
- The gas is $1.99 a gallon. Luckily, we drive a hybrid (and no, we don't need to plug it in). We get 42.6 miles to the gallon, but we still have to fill up every 426 miles or so (preferably a little more often).
- We're 300 miles from LA, and already there's a traffic jam.
Seven hundred and fifty miles later, we're sitting in the living room of CY and Ms. Leslita in El Paso, TX. CY made us a lovely vegan Moroccan stew, and we're now ready to rest and prepare for the trip ahead.
We left Corpus Christi as the sun rose over the bay, and we stopped along the bayfront to take pictures to show where we began. From Corpus, we took a straight shot up to San Antonio, and then west on I-10 to El Paso. It's straightforward from a navigational standppoint, but we were on the road for twelve hours, with frequent stops to rest or stretch or take pictures.
We are much further west than C has ever been, and it has been interesting for me to relive the geography and geology of West Texas through her. We went from the flat coastal plains to the rolling hill country, to the dry and desolate plateaus of west-central Texas, to the dusty mountains of west Texas. The air is dry here, and already, my lips are starting to chap.
Tomorrow, the plan is to go to the store to buy sodas, lip balm, and eye drops to combat the fierce dust, and then to explore southern New Mexico as much as we can in a day. The trick will be in trying not to succumb to the urge to do the "look-and-spit" tour of the western US -- there isn't much point in being out here if we aren't going to stop and look at things, at least... is there?
